Week 30!

We are 75% of the way there. Just about 10 weeks to go. And here is an updated baby belleh shot for all of you long-distance people...

A quick update

Yet another ultrasound and baby doc appointment day.

It was also the day of my glucose tolerance test. For those of you who don't know, this entails drinking a bottle of liquid, which tastes like either flat orange soda or melted flavorice, within 5 minutes and then having your blood drawn exactly an hour later. This is a good reminder about the peril of giving too much sugar to your kids. She could not sit still for the entire ultrasound and even when we were just waiting for the doc to come in, you could see her (from across the room) flipping around in there.

It was funny for us, but a little hard for the sonographer! The result is that Ms. Ella is growing strong. She is about 2 lbs and 12 ozs and somewhere between 15 and 17 inches. She is measuring just where she should be.

11 weeks and a few days to go!

Update: Blood glucose test came back fine - no gestational diabetes for me.

13 weeks to go!

Apparently, over the last four weeks, Ms. Ella has doubled in size. She is now about 15 inches and a little over 2 pounds.

And it shows...

Reflections on Fathers Day

As I woke up on Sunday I had my first "semi"-official Father's Day. As I glanced at our growing daughter inside of Stacey's belly, I could feel the heightened excitement of wanting to see her. We have had many ultrasounds to see our daughter but I'm growing impatient to see her in person. To welcome her into the world. Help her grow. Teach her to be strong. Fill her life with love and support. Instruct her on the nuances of the game of tennis. The world of Star Wars. How controlling the neutral zone in hockey is just as important as having a right wing sniper.

I realize I will stumble along the way. No parent is ever 100% perfect. But I will learn to adjust. Learn to have more patience. Learn to compromise. Learn to take care of diaper changings. Learn to know when to let her discover things on her own. Learn when to just be there to listen. Learn to love pink (if that is indeed her color of choice). And most importantly, learn to learn more with her at our side.

A Happy Father's Day indeed!

Bruins Baby!

Another day, another doctor's appointment. Baby Ella is growing like a weed, ahead by a week in many places. She is developing so well that instead of bi-weekly ultrasounds, we will have them every six weeks. However, the appointments will continue to be bi-weekly.

On this oh-so-important Game 6 day, she already knows where her professional hockey loyalties lie...


And her mom is feeling a lot of growth spurts...!

Where we learn more about Ella's little fin!

Today, we had our specialist appointment at Children's Hospital with Dr. Peter Waters. He specializes in pediatric orthopedic surgery and handles many, many cases like ours. The visit was reassuring and we are very glad to have him on our team come October.

Assuming things continue along as planned, we will not see him again until Ella is between 4-6 weeks old. At that point, he'll see what she is actually born with and will help make a plan going forward. Their focus will be on goals of either pinching or pushing with that hand. He agreed that it is huge that she has full wrist function.

Some interesting facts we learned today:
- Ella has what they call a trans-hand amputation, which is the 2nd most common kind of limb difference (second only to when the arm stop growing just past the elbow.)
- Limb differences occur in anywhere between 1 in 30,000 and 1 in 300,000, depending on the type of limb difference.
- Her arms will continue to grow proportionally, but they will both continue to grow. So, whatever the proportional difference is between her right and left arms at birth will likely continue into adulthood.
- Prosthetics are not where they need to be (cosmetically and functionally), especially for something like this, so most kids don't use them.
- The Department of Defense is the biggest leader in research for hand transplants and other missing hand solutions.
- Finding a good solution to missing a hand ranks in the top five for research goals.- There is absolutely nothing genetic about limb differences like these.

And finally...
- National studies have shown that kids with a limb difference actually grow up to be happier and more well-adjusted than so-called "normal kids"

That's it for now... we have a lull of a couple of weeks before our next doctor's appointment!

What's in a Name?

As many of you know, Lew and I have known the name of our baby girl for a while now. We were going to wait until October to officially introduce her to the world.

But, as the wonderful emails of support poured in this past week, we realized that she is more than Baby Girl Forman. She already has strength and personality, and a name to go with it.

So, we are happy to tell all of you that her name will be Ella, short for Pamela Catherine. Pamela was Lew's Mom who he lost at an early age and as many of you know, Catherine has a long lineage on my side of the family.

We can't wait to meet the jumpy little monkey and introduce her to all of you in October...

Children's Hospital Ultrasound Day!

First of all, thank you to everyone for your support. It means the world to both of us and our little girl.



Today was our first visit to Children's Hospital. That place is amazing...designed to be comforting to both parents and children. Everyone that we encountered was awesome and we are thrilled that she is going to have their support once she arrives.



We had a rather long ultrasound and they confirmed everything that Mt. Auburn said about the hand and that otherwise, she is perfect. They agree that it's very unlikely that it is ABS, so they have very few concerns.

We are still going to meet the doc on Friday so that we can talk about a plan for when she is born, but otherwise, we shouldn't need to go back to Children's until after she arrives. The only new thing that they said is that at Mt. Auburn they thought her hand stopped at her carpals, but it does look like she has some meta-carpals. (http://www.wikidoc.org/index.php/Image:Human_hand_bones_simple.svg) This means she could actually have a little but more there than we expected.


The wonder of going to a top-tier hospital is that they have great imaging for ultrasounds. Here is a picture of her sucking her thumb (on her right, non-affected hand):







And here is a 3-D picture of her face. She is already cute as a button...and will likely get cuter as her skin actually has time to develop more.






Finally, on the way out, we stopped by the lobby and found that they have a bunch of fish tanks to keep kids occupied...and one of them is set up to match Nemo's tank in the movie.




So, that's all for now...more updates as we move along...

Then and Now

Today, we are at 20 weeks, the halfway point of this pregnancy. So, here's a hint at our changing life.

This was 3 months ago...

And this is now...

Yes, she is already a Bruins fan!

Welcome!

We are starting this blog to hopefully chronicle our pregnancy journey, as well as the wild adventure we will be on when our baby girl arrives in October!